Open 193 - Friends and Enemies: It's over!

[Vi]

Let me surmise the case on charlatan: he makes bad arguments. He doesn't read the game like everyone else.

He changes his mind often.

He awkwardly distances from ABR in transparent attempts to cause drama (see isolated post #9). His bad arguments are aiming at my better Town reads. His bad arguments seem to rely on loopholes in his own words. His top defender throws down the word

proof

in attempting to refute the case, which by itself shows that he's reaching.

And I know charlatan, if and whether he is scum with PCE or not, he's going to make a lot more mistakes.

...so which mistakes has he made up until now, and why are they not enough to indict him?

DDD, he was voting for you a minute ago, don't tell me you're against lynching pce now.

I think I understand where ABR 520 is coming from, but that doesn't change
*that ABR is the one saying it, and I believe ABR has a vested interest in getting the wagon off charlatan
*that the PorkchopExpress wagon is flooded with scummy people and I don't want to join them

[Albert B. Rampage]

So we learn that charlatan likes drama. Good for him, maybe he'll get into drama school.

I agree with you that he made bad arguments. If you ask me, this is more a question of skill than alignment however. I am not against lynching charlatan in future days. Today, PCE.

[Albert B. Rampage]

Regardless, I don't think it's fair to bring meta into the equation since porkchop has yet to complete a game as mafia to my knowledge.

[VP Baltar]

Regardless, I don't think it's fair to bring meta into the equation since porkchop has yet to complete a game as mafia to my knowledge.

And this is fair enough I suppose because I don't care for one sided metas either, but I still don't think what you want to lynch him over outweighs the charlatan arguments.

I know you are interpreting it differently, but I think your read on it is pretty flatly wrong and one-sided.

[xRECKONERx]

@Whoever asked me: content-wise, there's not a whole lot there in charlatan's early posts. It's just the way that he presented himself gave me a gut town read, I guess. Given the developments later in the game, though, it obviously made him a strong scum read.

On PCE vs char:

I feel like either one or the other is scum. I see no connections between the two to link one to the other, so I don't think they're going to be on the same scumteam. PCE has been coasting so far this game to the point where when I got done doing my scumlist I was like 'Who am I missing? Oh, PCE and Ojanen." Only difference is, when Ojanen does post, it's at least neutral, whereas PCE gets by without doing much of anything aka scummy.

To be completely honest, at the risk of sounding like charlatan's fence-sitting, I only prefer a PCE-lynch like 50%, a charlatan lynch 35%, and a DDD lynch 15%.

Yes, I probably bastardized the english language there, I don't give a fook.

[Ojanen]

As a comment to the meta discussion of Chop (lol for VP who brought it up now not caring about one-sided metas very much): for me, looking at the iso of Porkchop in the linked game made me feel a good deal better of the validness of the scumtells he's exhibited here tbh. Yes, there were a couple of 3-4 day absences in the other game but as to most of the behaviour I actually thought scummy and scared in this game seemed absent in the other one.
In other words, a QFT to ABR's description.
Will post more in a bit.

[Zorblag]

I'm having a bit of trouble finding the time (when the site will cooperate and let me go back and look things up in any sort of efficient way) to get the post I want in so this will do for now.

My top three choices for lynches today at this time, in order are charlatan, xRECKONERx, PorkchopExpress. I'd also be willing to consider Ojanen or Sando and to a much lesser extent Albert B. Rampage or Vi if it was a choice between one of them and a no lynch. I still have no interest in lynching any of Amished, Debonair Danny DiPietro, SerialClergyman or VP Baltar today.

I don't really understand how this PorkchopExpress wagon got going. Albert B. Rampage pushing for something is probably a good sign if anything; he's managed to create a second wagon out of very little and he's forcing people to take sides in a way that they weren't really forced to with the charlatan vs. Debonair Danny DiPietro or whatever else might have been competing wagons previously. Saying that he was trying to derail the charlatan wagon doesn't take into account how long that wagon was there as a serious contender. I also don't have any reason to like what PorkchopExpress is doing so I'm not going to argue against people joining his wagon even though it's not my plan to do so myself. What I really don't like though is xRECKONERx's reaction to the wagon.

For some reason, even though his top three scum suspects in Post 432 were charlatan, PorkchopExpress and Debonair Danny DiPietro he didn't get around to voting for any of them. At the time there was a 5 vote wagon on charlatan, a 2 vote wagon on Debonair Danny DiPietro and no one at all on PorkchopExpress. When Albert B. Rampage starts the PorkchopExpress wagon he jumps on immediately and sounds excited about a starting wagon. Later we learn that charlatan and PorkchopExpress (and one assumes Debonair Danny DiPietro) were all about equally scummy in his eyes (Post 483) and then just recently that he apparently has different preferences for their lynches (Post 529.) It just doesn't fit.

If you've got three people you suspect equally why on Earth would you as town ignore the two that already have wagons going on them and wait till someone else starts a wagon on the third to join that. Even if you had a strong preference for the lynch for that third player (despite thinking the others were equally scummy) why not say that sooner and start the wagon yourself? Town with those top three suspects would have had really no compelling reason I can think of not to vote for either charlatan or Debonair Danny DiPietro (I might be able to come up with a reason for one of them but certainly not both) when they'd finished with their suspicions.

When you add that to Amished's tell (I'm not sold on it but I've thought about it some and I think I'm willing to use it as corroberative evidence), and how xRECKONERx doesn't seem to be settled on exactly what it was that made him give charlatan a town read in the first place (the story already seems to have changed) I'm finding him fairly scummy. I'm leaving my vote on charlatan at this point as I don't care for how he reacted in our exchange but if I thought that an xRECKONERx lynch were feasible today I would be completely willing to be a part of it as of now.

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[Albert B. Rampage]

Deadline please

[VP Baltar]

As a comment to the meta discussion of Chop (lol for VP who brought it up now not caring about one-sided metas very much)

I've never been a huge fan of one-sided metas and have been burnt by them in the past, but when I don't recall ever seeing a PCE scum game on site I don't have as much of a choice. It was simply a point of reference anyhow to say that the specific behavior people are attacking him over is similar to what I saw in Last Man Standing.

@Amished-I'm not entirely opposed to a xRx lynch today. I wasn't enamored with Scien when he was here and Reck's aversion to the charlatan wagon even though he and PCE relatively equal in scumminess in his eyes doesn't sit well with me. I'd prefer charlatan, but if it came down to it I'm perfectly ok with xRx going.

[Albert B. Rampage]

Charming.

I wasn't trying to convince you, I was asking if you would tell me your send best scum read.

I try, I believe it was PorkchopExpress when I reread the game.

You should vote for PCE.

charlatan should vote for PCE or die.

[SerialClergyman]

I agree with you that he made bad arguments. If you ask me, this is more a question of skill than alignment however.

This is rubbish.

[SerialClergyman]

I'm going to have limited access to mafia for a day or two, so I'll probably only be able to make small mobile posts, not large keyboard posts. (Cue joy)

[xRECKONERx]

VOTE COUNT PL0X

[Vi]

@Whoever asked me: content-wise, there's not a whole lot there in charlatan's early posts. It's just the way that he presented himself gave me a gut town read, I guess. Given the developments later in the game, though, it obviously made him a strong scum read.

This IS a butchery of the English language. Please try again.

On PCE vs char:

I feel like either one or the other is scum. I see no connections between the two to link one to the other, so I don't think they're going to be on the same scumteam. PCE has been coasting so far this game to the point where when I got done doing my scumlist I was like 'Who am I missing? Oh, PCE and Ojanen." Only difference is, when Ojanen does post, it's at least neutral, whereas PCE gets by without doing much of anything aka scummy.

There's something missing here... It's why you're not voting charlatan.
Further, there's a difference between "one or the other is scum" and "they're not scum together".

To be completely honest, at the risk of sounding like charlatan's fence-sitting, I only prefer a PCE-lynch like 50%, a charlatan lynch 35%, and a DDD lynch 15%.

...charlatan's fence-sitting?

---

I don't really understand how this PorkchopExpress wagon got going. Albert B. Rampage pushing for something is probably a good sign if anything; he's managed to create a second wagon out of very little and he's forcing people to take sides in a way that they weren't really forced to with the charlatan vs. Debonair Danny DiPietro or whatever else might have been competing wagons previously.

Saying that he was trying to derail the charlatan wagon doesn't take into account how long that wagon was there as a serious contender.

I also don't have any reason to like what PorkchopExpress is doing so I'm not going to argue against people joining his wagon even though it's not my plan to do so myself.

Wait, I thought you said you didn't really understand how the Porkchop wagon started
You don't think the PorkchopExpress wagon is scum-driven?
Could you explain the bolded?

----

U. Vote Count

:arrow: charlatan (L-2) ~ SerialClergyman, Trollblag, VP Baltar, Amished, Vi
PorkchopExpress (L-3) ~ ABR, xRx, Sando, Ojanen
VP Baltar (L-6) ~ charlatan
xRx (L-6) ~ DDD
Sando (L-6) ~ PorkchopExpress

[SerialClergyman]

What a sexy wagon on charlatan. Man. Who wouldn't want to get on that puppy.

[Sando]

I agree with you that he made bad arguments. If you ask me, this is more a question of skill than alignment however.

This is rubbish.

No it's not.

[xRECKONERx]

Because I think PCE is a better D1 lynch than a charlatan lynch is? Hey, charlatan-scum can die tomorrow... PCE is a non-contributor and I don't want to let him just float by the rest of the game with him almost-getting-lynched-but-never-quite-getting-there. Then all of a sudden it's OMG ENDGAME and he's scum.

[Albert B. Rampage]

Charlatan's behavior is an open-ended question mark that is soon to be resolved, whereas PCE is a solid lynch, plain and simple.

Let's just see how this plays out.

[Zorblag]

@Vi, although it seems pretty likely that there's scum on the PorkchopExpress wagon one way or another I don't know that I'd call it scum driven. I don't fully know Albert B. Rampage's motives for starting it but I don't believe that simply doing it to derail the charlatan wagon makes sense. That sort of switch when the game isn't moving is par for the course for Albert B. Rampage. If he had wanted it derailed just to derail it I think he would have moved sooner than he did; he certainly had the ability to do so pages earlier if that had been important. As for what I don't understand, it's really that it gained so many people so relatively quickly; the falling into place all of a sudden shouldn't just be a matter of 3 of the 4 on it now being scum (I suppose that might be happening but scum really don't clump like that in general) and it wasn't just a matter of being pressured or badgered or tricked into it or anything. I'm not seeing why 2 or 3 town would fall into place that quickly on an issue which wasn't a change from what had been happening all game (lack of content from PorkchopExpress.)

@xRECKONERx, why didn't you bring up that preference before Albert B. Rampage voted for PorkchopExpress? That seems to be some of your issue with Debonair Danny DiPietro as well; why not join his wagon with your suspicion list? Or do I misunderstand what it is you didn't like about Debonair Danny DiPietro's play? It looked like it was lurking and then an OMGUS vote and then I suppose I'm not sure. Is there that much less concern that we'd be letting him lurk to endgame, almost getting lynched but never quite as scum than there is for PorkchopExpress?

-Zorblag R`Lyeh

[SerialClergyman]

We've just had a game where charlatan skillfully convinced the entire town that he was a townie. He never looked like being lynched and didn't make any glaring mistakes that I noticed.

Why then would we assume his ability was poor this game? Why would we suggest, as Albert does, that he will make 'more' mistakes later on during the game?

Rubbish.

[Sando]

"He never looked like being lynched"

Clearly the games are exactly the same then...

I wanted you to justify your 'rubbish' though, cheers.

[Albert B. Rampage]

Maybe to the untrained eye, his game in the last invitational could be mistaken as "skillful". However, being on the inside last game, the errors he committed could be described as bountiful to the very least.

But even if we disregard this, just because he is lost in his own head doesn't point to him being scum one way or the other. I will tell you what happened. You caught him off guard and he defended himself as best he could, sometimes contradicting himself in his defense, sometimes making bad arguments thinking he could brush off the attacks. This could happen to anyone.

In fact, the case on charlatan is the type of case I would use as scum. It's an easy answer the town is looking for and delighted by. The hard reality is that there are no easy answers in this game.

The charlie case is a myth. And I, am a legend.

Chop chop.

[Amished]

-snip-

As for what I don't understand, it's really that it gained so many people so relatively quickl

y; the falling into place all of a sudden shouldn't just be a matter of 3 of the 4 on it now being scum (I suppose that might be happening but scum really don't clump like that in general) and it wasn't just a matter of being pressured or badgered or tricked into it or anything.

I'm not seeing why 2 or 3 town would fall into place that quickly on an issue which wasn't a change from what had been happening all game (lack of content from PorkchopExpress.)

-snip-

(Bolding mine)

Exactly. Right now I read ABR town by PoE (my scum reads are all pretty strong) but then 2/3 scum hopping on *is* reasonable and would make sense if the counter-wagon (Char) is scum and they're trying to build it when nothing has really changed.

However, I'm really wondering why we'd (proverbial we) expect people to make mistakes.

Even more to the point, ABR: You've seen Charlatan make mistakes *as town*. Why would him making mistakes here now be a scumtell?

[Ojanen]

If I was a patient girl, I would ask from you people to go read Porkchop's iso and find the self-offered

stance

on something, an expression of suspicion, something concrete.
I'm not patient though.
It's in iso 9 (corresponding to page 13).
Nothing before that looks like it's gonna go anywhere.
And the stance is

incredibly

safe.

In other news, I think it's dodgy for DDD to cry foul for being an easy target since this is a byproduct of the playstyle that he is wilfully engaged in.

After the next post in a few days he decides to indeed switch his random vote to DDD because of this attitude and not posting much thing.
His other suspicions are the under-bigtime-heat charlatan and Sando. Which is again incredibly safe. And his reason for suspecting Sando is hypocritical to the max, having never directly commented himself ABRvs.VP at all:

You seem to be a little preoccupied with side issues at the moment and I’m starting to get scummy vibes from it. Especially since you’ve barely spoken about the ABR/VP discussion amount.

The last posts, the concerns he's raising/the manner of tugging of charlatan don't strike me well either, but blah. I'm not finding the words to dissect my gut on those right now. Same variety of associating to artificial.

The rare posting does not bother me nearly as much as Porkchop's profoundly vague and go-with-the-flow stuff, and that is what I was referring to when I said the actual scummy stuff I can't see like this in the other linked game.
I spent a good deal of this say voting Porkchop and am happy to have a wagon on him now. Mere low contribution being depicted as a reason is irritating.

[Albert B. Rampage]

Charlatan, if he is scum, will make more damning mistakes in the future than what is passing for a case nowadays...